Harford warns Luton to be ready for a 'dangerous' Posh side

Hatters interim boss Mick Harford has warned his side that they will come up against a 'dangerous, dangerous outfit' when facing fellow League One promotion-chasers Peterborough United at Kenilworth Road this afternoon.
Hatters interim boss Mick HarfordHatters interim boss Mick Harford
Hatters interim boss Mick Harford

The visitors have the joint best away record in the table this season, scoring an impressive 30 goals already, by the far the top scorers on their travels.

Striker Ivan Toney is leading the way with 17 goals already, while Posh have also brought in Cardiff's Lee Tomlin on loan, a player who has been transferred for fees totalling just under £9 during his career.

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Harford said: "I’ve watched Peterborough regularly this season, I know exactly what they’re all about in terms of shape, what they do, how they want to play.

"It looks like to me over the last few games, they’ve brought in a couple of players, they’ve changed the way they’re looking to play in terms of possession based football and they’ve got results.

"So they’re a dangerous, dangerous outfit, they’ve got good strikers, they’ve got pace, they’ve got talented players in (Siriki) Demeble and (Marcus) Maddison, they've signed Tomlin who in my opinion is above the level he’s playing at.

"So they’re a massive threat, they have a magnificent away record, they're better away from home than they are at home, and we’ve got to be wary of that and we will be."

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Peterborough came on top of the earlier game at the ABAX Stadium back in August, winning 3-1, after blowing Town away with three first half goals.

However, Harford believed that helped Luton become the side they have this term, currently sitting second in the table, saying: "We don’t like getting beat and I think actually the performance, what happened, started to shape our season in terms of the way Nathan picked his team."

On crossing swords with Posh boss Steve Evans in the dugouts, Harford continued: "Steve’s very animated on the touchline , along with his assistant (Paul) Rayner and they’re very lively and very bright.

"It’s a tactic they use to try and get into the officials, but that’s part of the game, we understand that.

"They’re good lads who do a good job wherever they go.

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"Steve Evans is a very, very successful manager, you look at this record in terms of the clubs he’s been at and the percentage of games he’s won, he gets results that manager.

"So fair play to him, it will be a tough game for us."

Harford, who will now take charge of his third game since Nathan Jones left for Stoke, believes the club remains in an excellent place under his temporary stewardship.

He added: "When we lost our manager, we didn’t really want to change anything, so we kept it all the same.

"We've brought Inigo (Idiakez) in to replace Joaquin (Gomez) as a first team coach, so everything’s just going along smoothly.

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"There's not much change, as we said, it wasn’t broke, so we didn’t fix it, we just carried on as normal.

"I watched the games back, Sunderland and Sheffield Wednesday, debriefed and we take lots of positives from them.

"If you tie them together, it was two really good performances and different kinds of game.

"Sheffield Wednesday, you wouldn’t have noticed who was the Championship side in terms of the way the game panned out.

"I thought they showed us a hell of a lot of respect by coming in and matching our shape, setting up in a diamond, so it was a real, real good competitive game."